Principal Program Manager, Business Operations

About the role

The Zillow Preferred team is at the heart of Zillow's partner-led growth, designing how high-performing real estate teams deliver more connected experiences for our shared customers. Business Operations plays a pivotal role in advancing Zillow's mission to build the future of integrated transactions by developing scalable programs, tools, and operational strategies that empower teams to operate efficiently and effectively. Our focus is on driving partner success, optimizing return on investment, and ensuring program policies and compliance scale with the business, while fostering cross-functional relationships to solve complex challenges and deliver high-impact solutions. As Principal Program Manager, you will lead high-impact, cross-functional initiatives that protect revenue, ensure compliance, and enable the Preferred program to scale sustainably from strategy through execution. You will operate at the intersection of Product, Business Operations, Legal, Finance, and GTM teams, managing initiatives where execution quality directly impacts revenue integrity, regulatory posture, and long-term program scalability. This role requires a hypothesis-driven approach to problem solving, the ability to connect diverse inputs to identify opportunities, and clear communication of tradeoffs at the leadership level. Success is achieved through collaborative influence, strong partnerships, analytical rigor, and translating strategy into operational reality. You Will Get To Identify, validate, and implement strategic solutions for new concepts, programs, and policies to optimize business performance, using analysis, research, pilots, and proof-of-concept testing. Lead large-scale, cross-functional initiatives from concept through execution by defining scope, developing project plans, managing workstreams, conducting impact analyses, and driving alignment through clear communications and leadership-level readouts. Drive data-informed decision-making by leading analyses of complex business and operational challenges, designing and implementing operational reporting and analytical proofs of concept. Develop and operationalize policy frameworks and assessment protocols for payment and compliance, partnering with legal, industry, and cross-functional teams to align business strategy, regulatory obligations, and program contract language. Proactively identify, evaluate, and mitigate revenue and programmatic risks. Create and implement policies to address outstanding payments, minimize contra revenue, and mitigate bad debt. Partner with Product and cross-functional teams to implement payment-related features and process improvements, supporting go-to-market and adoption strategies. This role has been categorized as a Remote position. "Remote" employees do not have a permanent corporate office workplace and, instead, work from a physical location of their choice, which must be identified to the Company. U.S. employees may live in any of the 50 United States, with limited exceptions. In California, Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Washington state, and Washington DC the standard base pay range for this role is $153,600.00 - $245,400.00 annually. This base pay range is specific to these locations and may not be applicable to other locations. In Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Minnesota, Nevada, Ohio, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Virginia the standard base pay range for this role is $145,900.00 - $233,100.00 annually. The base pay range is specific to these locations and may not be applicable to other locations. In addition to a competitive base salary this position is also eligible for equity awards based on factors such as experience, performance and location. Actual amounts will vary depending on experience, performance and location. Employees in this role will not be paid below the salary threshold for exempt employees in the state where they reside.